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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24296563">folded arms &amp; history books</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/MooseFeels/pseuds/MooseFeels'>MooseFeels</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Commissions [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>M/M, Magic, Midwifery, Undertaking</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 01:47:11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,792</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24296563</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/MooseFeels/pseuds/MooseFeels</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Yuuri was born differently, and he has obligations. <br/>Viktor is an outsider, everywhere he goes. <br/>Somehow, they tangle into each other.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Commissions [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1733704</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>33</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/MildSweet/gifts">MildSweet</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written as a commission for MildSweet in support of the Navajo &amp; Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Minako tells Yuuri that he was born with a caul over his head. She mentions it casually one morning, over breakfast. Cradling an egg into a bowl of warm rice, her gaze is fixed solidly away from Yuuri, focus resting on the easy matters of mortal meals. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You were the first birth I attended,” she says. “Well, in my capacity as a </span>
  <em>
    <span>professional</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Everyone attends at least </span>
  <em>
    <span>one</span>
  </em>
  <span> birth.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She hands Yuuri the bowl. It’s Yuuri’s because it has extra pickles and no soy sauce. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The other adults Yuuri knows, they treat him differently. They talk down to him, like he’s too little to understand and too slow to be told in the first place. His parents, they’re nice to him and never cruel like other people, but they don’t understand him. They don’t see what he sees. They don’t see the world the way he sees it-- sees it the way it really is. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Minako, though, Minako talks to Yuuri the way she talks to his mother. Like an old friend-- like an equal. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri knows that this is important, what they’re talking about. He looks up from the bowl, at Minako. “I’ve known your mother since we were girls,” she says. “When she asked me to be there, it was an honor. And then it was you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Minako makes pretty good pickles. Not as good as his Mama’s, but pretty good. Yuuri likes his Mama’s cooking more than anything else, he thinks. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you know why you’re here, with me?” She asks. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri shakes his head. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I want to be your teacher,” she says. “I think one day, you might do amazing things, and I want to help you learn how to do them.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What kinds of things?” Yuuri asks. </span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>Minako lives in the woods, up a mountain and far away from the beach. It smells less like salt and deep, inky water and more like cypresses and snow. He has lived with her for two years, old enough that he doesn’t cry when he leaves home after New Year now. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re growing up, Yuuri,” Minako says. “And that means you can take some more responsibility. Physical discipline is mental discipline. We need rice, for the week.The merchant in the village knows how much, and has already been paid. You’ve had breakfast; bring us lunch.” She hands him a framepack, woven out of wide leaves and bamboo. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri nods. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The path down the mountain has stones at the edges of it, and it winds down, down, down. It’s nice. Yuuri tries to whistle while he walks. Mari can whistle, and even though he won’t see her again until this winter, he wants to practice as much as he can. He wants to sound like a choir of birds when he sees her again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri wants his Mama’s cooking and he wants his family to be proud of him, more than almost anything. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The rice merchant is nice. She has kind eyes, even if her voice is sharp and short. She fills the pack and Yuuri stands by her stall and rocks on his heels, back and forth, looking at the market. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>This is the first time Yuuri sees him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri can tell he’s older than him. He’s taller and he’s so graceful-- like a willow bough bending gently. He has strange hair, the color of the creekwater in the deep winter. He throws his head back when he laughs, covering his mouth with his hand. Yuuri sees him, watches him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Little apprentice, do you need anything else?” The rice merchant asks him. Yuuri tears himself from the sight of the stranger, to look back at the rice merchant. He blinks a couple of time, and she smiles, slyly. “Ah, you see the merchant boy? He’s charmed everyone. Oh, VIktor!” She calls to him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri feels his cheeks heat. Before anything more can happen he says, “Thank you, we are honored by your service,” and he pulls the pack onto his back and heads back down the trail, back up the winding path into the mountain, back to Minako’s little house in the forest and back to his lessons-- to incense and salt and speaking to the dead. </span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>Yuuri is seventeen the next time he sees him. He has not been home for New Year for five years, since he was twelve. He has not cried about home-- about leaving, about Mama and Papa and Mari and the springs-- since he was seven. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri is seventeen and Minako is letting him go to the summer festival, down in the village and he is nervous. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s so much to learn, and there’s not a lot of time. Minako can’t keep Yuuri here forever-- there are villages deeper into the country that need his skills. Yuuri usually comes into the village once a week to get rice, and then he is studying, practicing. Yuuri is singing the songs of the dead and he is dancing the dances of the living, because one day soon he will have to do them for real, for a village that depends on him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Go,” Minako says. “Have </span>
  <em>
    <span>fun. </span>
  </em>
  <span>Don’t come back until after midnight.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So, Yuuri goes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Or--</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Well--</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri goes, but it’s so </span>
  <em>
    <span>much</span>
  </em>
  <span>. It’s even more people than on market days-- it’s more people all in one place than Yuuri has seen in his life. There’s so much sound. Idle chatter and screaming and shouting and there are drums and instruments and firecrackers and fire. There’s so many people and so much light and sound and--</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“This was a mistake,” Yuuri murmurs, under his breath.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What was?” Someone asks behind him. </span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>Their travel is a long circuit, across the country and back, into the ocean and through and around islands and seas. There’s trade that must happen and there’s traders who must facilitate it, and Viktor is like Yakov-- he has no home. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Viktor thinks he did once, but his memory has never been good. When he tries to remember, the only thing he can recall is the fire. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Yakov needs help-- needs someone strong enough to load and unload the hull, needs someone smart enough to learn all the languages, needs someone charming enough to talk to the locals and get them the best deal. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Of course, there’s a festival when they march from the coast through the winding forest road and across farmer’s fields into the mountain town. All the stalls and merchants are doing business, but none of them have the time to speak with Viktor about what he has in the hulls of the boat that long walk back. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Still, a festival is a nice surprise. Viktor is content to drift from stall to stall, and he’ll stay the night in a tree instead of hiking back into port overnight. Ply his wares in the morning. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’s eating </span>
  <em>
    <span>something</span>
  </em>
  <span> (it’s delicious, but he’ll be damned if he knew what it was) when he hears someone say, “This was a mistake.”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>Viktor, for all his virtues, is nosy. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What was?” He asks, turning around. </span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>The knock on his door comes low to the ground-- this is the first thing Yuuri thinks, when he hears it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri doesn’t have an apprentice, and he doesn’t live with anyone else. It’s just him and his hearth, out here in the woods, right on the boundary of the wild. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s well after midnight. Yuuri knows it must be dire, if a child is knocking on his door in the dark. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes?” Yuuri greets, hand heavy before the door. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fortune-Teller Katsuki, it’s Minami!” A voice cries on the other side. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Thunder rolls outside; Yuuri opens the door. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Minami, come inside-- what’s happened?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yuuko’s water broke,” he says, standing in the driving rain. “Nishigori told me--”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>“Let me get my coat,” Yuuri says. “I’m coming.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s easy to smother the hearth, grab his straw raincoat and his pack and run out the door. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The only sound as they wind and wander, down through the trail and into the village is the rain slapping against the stones and leaves. It’s dangerous-- slippery and pitch black. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri can see things other people don’t, though. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It feels like the longest journey of his life, every time, the long walk out of the woods and to where they need him. Yuuri never feels like he’s fast enough. He knows one day he won’t be. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri, distantly, prays that this will not be that day. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>There’s a lantern out on the porch of the Nishigori house. The door is closed. Yuuri unlaces his coat before knocking, turning to Minami. “Do they have a fire alive?” He asks.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Minami nods. “Checked it before I got you,” he says. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri nods. “Good. Go to the well and get water. Get as much water as you can. Set some to boil.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Minami runs off, and Yuuri steps inside. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He can hear her, her cry high and drained from the back of the room. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Minami was right-- there’s a fire in the center of the room but it’s beginning to sputter. Yuuri throws wood on and steps into the back of the house. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Nishigori Yuuko is a little like Yuuri, but different. She makes her husband a tidy sum making thick blocks of ice, even in the hottest pitch of summer. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>This is her first pregnancy. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Nishigori Takeshi is pale as snow when Yuuri put his hand on his shoulder to pull him away from his wife, who is panting. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yuuko,” Yuuri says, his voice firm and clear. “I’m here.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuko’s eyes, they are so heavy with pain, with fear. “My mother,” she pants. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Takeshi,” Yuuri says. “Take the nag in your stable; you’ll be back by sunrise.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What about--” He begins, as Yuuko shrieks out, wordless. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Minami can help me here-- go get her mother!” Yuuri barks, knowing that for all Takeshi is a good man, he is not equipped to help in this room the way Yuuko’s mother is. Takeshi was supposed to bring her up the mountain for this </span>
  <em>
    <span>three weeks from now</span>
  </em>
  <span>. And Minami was there when Yuuri delivered his brother five years ago </span>
  <em>
    <span>and</span>
  </em>
  <span> his youngest brother three years ago. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Takeshi pauses. He steps forward, quickly, to kiss his wife on the forehead and he sprints out of the house. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s just Yuuri and Yuuko now. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yuuri,” Yuuko moans, panting. “Yuuri, it’s too </span>
  <em>
    <span>early</span>
  </em>
  <span>!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But they cannot be stopped, can they?” Yuuri says. It’s easier to deflect than admit the truth-- that he’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>terrified</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri’s nervous before every birth, but this is Yuuko’s first pregnancy and there’s definitely more than one baby. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m setting the water!” Minami calls from the other room. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The charm unwinds from Yuuri’s wrist easily. The ribbon is still as bright red as it was when Viktor gave it to him, the edges still crisp and smooth. It’s weighted on either end, by a stone with a hole on one side and a large pearl on the other. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>I can’t accept a gift without reciprocating</span>
  </em>
  <span>, he’d said. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuri ties the charm around Yuuko’s ankle, letting the tails drag down. Yuuri has yet to lose a woman in birth, and every child he has delivered living has been willful and eager to survive. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He knows good luck charms must run out, must wear out </span>
  <em>
    <span>eventually</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He hopes it’s not tonight. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Minami,” he calls. “Can you breathe with her while I wash my hands?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Minami is there quickly and quietly, sitting down beside Yuuko and taking her hands. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“With me,” Minami says, and Yuuri gets up and pulls a bowl of the scalding water from the kettle. He shakes the blood from his hands and holds his breath as he dunks them in, pulling them out shaking. There’s a bundle of rags in his pack, and he dunks them into the water, carrying the bowl and his pack into the room. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yuuko, I’m going to look now,” he says. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yuuko gasps and nods her head.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This is going to be a long night.</span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>The storm came up the mountain suddenly</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The woman is kind enough to give him a place to sleep for the night and to rest his horse. He thanks her profusely. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I cannot thank you enough, Madame,” Viktor says, bowing low. “I am so abundantly blessed, it would be unfair if I were also gifted with a strong sense of direction.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She laughs. “You’re too handsome to catch your death of cold,” she says. “Please, please.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>This is how Viktor finds himself sitting beside a low, square hearth, warm against the clatter of rain on the roof. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We do not often see travelers this deep in the country,” she says. “What brings you this way?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She’s been gracious enough to give him a bowl of rice. Viktor looks up from it, smiles. “I met someone,” he says. “A long time ago. I tried to find him and they told me he had moved a three days’ march, up the mountain. So, here I go, two days into my three day journey.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It sounds like it’s been much more than a journey of three days,” she murmurs. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Viktor laughs. “Perhaps so,” he says. “But not an unpleasant one.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is it far, from where you come?” She asks. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Viktor shrugs. “As far from home as anyone else,” he says. “Am I so obvious a foreigner?” (He is).  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>A pleasant quiet develops between the two of them while they eat. It’s later, as Viktor is following his host to the bedroom that she says, “Oh, did you know Fortune Teller Okukawa?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Viktor pauses. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She gestures, to the carved charm hung from a cord fashioned to a buttonhole on his coat. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>It will keep you safe for me,</span>
  </em>
  <span> he’d said, flushed with drink. Yuuri. Yuuri had said, in the village a two day’s ride from here,  where they held the summer festival. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It’s a carved piece of ivory, immeasurably precious. Stained and polished from Viktor running his fingers over it constantly. It’s round, but cut so that the light passes through it, forming curves around the wings of birds and clouds. It’s a beautiful thing, but it’s the memory of Yuuri that makes it a treasure beyond price.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No,” he says. “It was a gift from a friend.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His host looks at it a little closer. She turns around. “Odd,” she says. “It looks just like one that belonged to the Fortune-Teller down mountain from us.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She says nothing more of it though, and leaves Viktor to fall asleep in a small, square room, among the sound of rain. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Viktor’s fingers explore the familiar cut curves and flourishes of the charm. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Is it dangerous? </span>
  </em>
  <span>Yuuri had asked him. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Oh, terribly, </span>
  </em>
  <span>Viktor had answered</span>
  <em>
    <span>. Terrible storms! Pirates! Bandits!</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Yuuri laughs, sweeter than honey, more sustaining than kasha. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>They’re both a little drunk, preciously close to each other. Yuuri is blushing. Viktor thinks he must be, too. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“Will you be back?” Yuuri asks him. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“I don’t know,” Viktor answers. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“That must be what you tell everyone,” Yuuri says, not looking at him. They’re sitting on a hill, looking at the village below, at the little figures of the festival goers milling around. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“It’s not,” Viktor says. He’s not proud of himself. “I usually tell them I’ll be back.” He swallows. His throat is suddenly dry. From far away, firecrackers shatter and pop in the air. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“Here,” Yuuri says, fiddling with something on his clothes. He pulls out something round, attached to a long cord. “It’s…it’s a charm. It’ll keep you safe, until you come back to me.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Yuuri pulls him forward, by the lapels of his coat and pulls the cord through a buttonhole, tying it to Viktor. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>They’re close to each other. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>The summer air is warm and wet and close. Viktor can see the dewy sweat on Yuuri’s skin, see the fascinating symmetry of his brown eyes. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Viktor leans in closer, watching the curve of Yuuri’s pink mouth. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Idly, Viktor wonders if Yuuri has been kissed. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>He’s awoken by urgent conversation. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>It’s too soon!”</span>
  </em>
  <span> the woman hisses. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>But it’s happening! Fortune-Teller Katsuki sent me!” </span>
  </em>
  <span>A man says back. “</span>
  <em>
    <span>He said if we left now we could be there before sunrise.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Viktor sits up, listening. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“I have a traveller!” </span>
  </em>
  <span>She cries. “</span>
  <em>
    <span>And that nag will die before it makes this ride again--”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Yuuko is giving birth!”</span>
  </em>
  <span> The man interrupts. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Viktor pulls his coat on and steps out of the room. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The man, the newcomer looks at him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“My wife,” he says. “Her daughter. Our first children.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Take my horse,” Viktor says. “I can ride behind, slower.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The man is soaked to the bone. HIs eyes are determined and worried. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You would do that?” The woman-- his host-- says. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“One act of kindness begets another,” he says. “We should go.”</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
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